Networked rendering devices can interact with an assemblage of other rendering devices, client devices, servers, and other components that are connected to and communicate over a network. One example of a rendering device is an MFD (Multi-Function Device), which includes the functionality of multiple rendering devices such as printers, scanners, faxes, copy machines, and so forth. Each MFD in a network, for example, can include a variety of print capabilities options such as, finishing, media quality, supply levels and size. Such networked rendering devices can be communicatively linked with a client device in order to provide various operations such as, for example, printing, scanning, and other operations within the network.
Client devices such as, for example, personal computers, laptop computers, handheld computing devices such as mobile phones, and so forth can include a host application that permits a user to submit a rendering job and select a rendering device within the network. Such a host application decouples the process of submitting the rendering job from the selection of the rendering device.
Most prior art approaches for submitting and selecting a rendering job from a client device to a rendering device offer a list of available rendering devices within the network. The list can include details such as, for example, an installation order, an IP address, a MAC address, a DNS name, a device name, model, location, and status with respect to the networked rendering device, which may not be easily interpreted by a typical user. Such approaches are unable to sort the list according to user-required criteria. A list can be alternatively displayed with user-friendly names sorted according to the print job criteria and utilizing an algorithm. With this approach, however, it is difficult to identify a rendering device associated with appropriate print capabilities with respect to the rendering job.
Based on the foregoing, it is believed that a need exists for an improved system and method for ranking a networked rendering device with visual cues, as described in greater detail herein.